I am constantly confused about counting calories. Obviously, I can eat pre-packaged stuff and easily count calories. However, I can't only eat pre-packaged food. It is so hard to try and figure out my calories when I eat out or when I cook (which I do a lot). It seems like there is a lot of guesswork going on with my calorie counting.

How do you guys do it? This summer I had tons of free time since I teach and I counted calories and in a few weeks lost 5 pounds (I only need to lose a total of 20 so that is great). What I would do is plan my meals the night before. I had all this time to look up all the ingredients in a casserole (for example) and then do the math. However, with me now being back in the REAL WORLD, I simply don't have the time. I usually do okay on Sunday and fall apart by Wednesday.

My question is this: What do you do? Are you like I was in the summer and plan everything out the night before? Do you rely on pre-packaged only? Do you guesstimate? I really want to hear from everyone, but I am especially intersted in hearing from those of you who have done this for a long time. You know...the ones who now see this as their way of life. Right now it is a huge struggle for me and certainly not my way of life. I prefer to eat what I want, when I want and how much I want (hehe). Hence, I have 150 pounds on a 5'2" frame

On a good note...I walked the dog for 40 minutes today. I simply must celebrate my little victories.

Thanks everyone for your help. I get frustrated sometimes reading these posts because some posts make it seem like it is so easy for some people. Oh yeah...major pity party here

I'm a creature of habit in terms of my snacks, breakfast, and lunches (I have 1-3 options for each all within 50 calories of each other). But, I figure out my meals for a week in advance when to comes to supper.

I find this method helpful not only when it comes to grocery shopping (I like to get it all out of the way at once), but, then I know when I get home from a long day that I DO have a meal planned out and that I don't "really need that pizza". For calculations of things that are recipe related (lasagna, soups ect) I rely on sparkrecipes (an extension of the sparkpeople website) to plug everything in and put in the number of servings.

For something things approximation is key however, like if I'm eating out and I get salad dressing on the side of my salad I can make an educated guess of how much 3 TBSP is ect.

If I was having to figure out a different meal for each meal, every day, I'd go crazy...my "habit meals" format allows me to mix it up while knowing that I'm within calories for the most part.

Either my husband or I cook virtually every meal, every day, every night (we're lucky enough to have the time to do this). We used to do pre-packaged and fast food stuff all the time--that's why I have way more than 150 pounds packed onto MY 5'2" frame.

It's a bit of a pain in the butt at first, quite honestly. I go to my chosen diet journal, Fitday, and enter in all the ingredients for a new dish on a clean sheet. Fitday adds all that stuff up for me at the bottom, so I transcribe the information, divide by six or eight or however much one portion of the recipe would be, then I enter that information as a serving of this custom food.

There are probably easier ways to get calorie counts on recipes, but I find that this way guarantees a count I can trust. Plus, every time I sit down and do this with a favorite recipe, I never have to do it again as Fitday now has these custom dishes saved.

Another thing that helps is making a lot of fairly simple dishes. It's easier to count up the calories in my six-ingredient meat loaf, for instance, than it is to count up my husband's chicken and andouille gumbo because "Iron Chef Creole" over there likes to add a tablespoon of duck fat here and a handful of celery there until it's hard to keep track of just WHAT he's done.

I also use some guesstimation. Fitday does have some items pre-programmed, and while I wouldn't rely on it to tell me an accurate count of a complex recipe, I do trust it to handle "egg, whole, cooked, omelet" and other simple meals. If something has more than three or four ingredients or if it's something I eat all the time, I make a custom listing for it. Otherwise, I figure Fitday has me covered.

Logging your food becomes easier with time. For one thing, it becomes an ingrained habit; for another, you build up a big library of favorites that you've already recorded. I couldn't live without my custom foods, as I eat variations on them so frequently.

Hope that helps.

Both of your posts help. I guess I thought I had it all figured out this summer and then got slapped in the face this fall when I was brought back to reality by my very demanding job.

I like the idea of habit meals because isn't that basically what all of us do anyway? Even if what we are eating is bad for us like Big Macs....most of us made a habit out of it, right?

I am going to check out Fitday and Sparkrecipes.

Thanks again for all your help.

I'm a teacher, too--180 kids this year, 2 totally different AP preps and a major extracurricular, so trust me when I say you CAN calorie count on a teacher's schedule.

Get a kitchen scale. Weighing things is a thousand times easier, cleaner, and more accurate. Best $20 in the world.

Don't eat things you can't count. This saves a lot of empty calories. Not sure how to include the chips and salsa? Don't eat it.

Take the time. It doesn't really take a lot of time any one day, but it takes some time every single day. It may seem like a PITA, but so is taking a shower and brushing your teeth: these are just things that have to be done.

That above sentence kinda scared me.

*This* is the real world if you ask me. Every day life. That's the reality.

And yes, it does take time - initially, learning the calorie counts. Once you get it down pat, it's simple. But like anything new and unknown, it takes some time to become accustomed with it.

But once you know the calorie counts, this lifestyle STILL takes up time. I cook most of my foods. I eat an enormous amount of veggies, which takes time to prepare. I eat lots of low fat proteins which takes time. It takes time to plan for these things, purchase these things,cook these things and then clean up the mess.

You must come to realize that this is worthy of each and every second you spend on it. You must MAKE the time for it. Really, what could be a better use of time, then the time spent getting healthy and remaining healthy?

This has to be a tippy, tippy, tippy top priority. It can't be something done only when convenient; only when circumstances permit. Eating healthy won't happen on it's own. It takes pre-thought and planning and TIME.

This has to be such a priority in your life, that to not spend time on it would be ludicrous. Absolutely ludicrous.

You spoke of it not being a way of life - yet. That's to be expected. You're used to doing things the old way. It DOES take time to get these new good habits ingrained in you. But they will. They will. At that point it will be automatic to you and habitual. It will be just what you do without giving it *much* thought. The idea is to create a new normal.

You'll have to push yourself though. You'll have to require more from yourself. You'll have to raise your standards. It's a wonderful time of self growth and discovery.

As far as that planning goes, you'll have to do it every single day. Not just till mid-week. That has been one of my major keys to success - planning. Much easier to stay on plan when you've got one.

As far as counting calories, you will learn what chicken is, fish is, etc. You'll learn about the counts of different veggies and so on and so forth.

For me this is quite easy now. My breakfast is always the same. My lunches, I switch off between a few different lunches with all the same calorie counts. Dinners? I switch those around too, all of them having almost identical counts. Snacks? Ditto.

But that didn't happen overnight. It took a bit till I got to that point. But you must recognize that it's worthy of every second that it takes.

I plan my breakfast and lunch the night before (and breakfast is usually one of 3 things: toast, oatmeal or eggs) so it's easy to track.

The only thing I eat out of a package is my yogurt or tortillas (or milk) everything else is veggies, rice, butter, bread (unsliced, so I weigh it when I slice it) meats, etc. that either get weighed or measured then tracked.

I figure I spend time every day either tracking or balancing my money, and cleaning my house so why not take some time to tend to my body and it's needs too.

And with the Sparkpeople app on my iPhone it's very easy to track.

shmead...wow..what an incredible number of students

rockinrobin...thanks for your post....i guess i tend to put everyone else before me and i take the leftovers (no food pun intended)..i have bile reflux and some days feel so much better than others....wouldn't it be great if i could come up with a plan that not only let me lose weight but also control the reflux....again i really appreciate your words of encouragement...it know what i need to do but just don't do it...it is crazy because i am super organized and disciplined in EVERY other area of my life

I cannot improve on what rockinrobin said.

I know...I keep reading over and over where she said I need to raise my standards....Ouch...I give 100% to everything and everyone but myself. Wow....I will read her post probably daily Glad she shared so openly, you know?